Since 1986, Spirit of Grace (initially named Mission of the Atonement) has been a community of Roman Catholics and Lutherans gathering for worship and fellowship with the blessing of both the Archdiocese of Portland in Oregon (Roman Catholic) and the Oregon Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA).

SPIRIT OF GRACE timeline

November 1985: A crisis became an opportunity when Atonement Lutheran Church, which was in the shadow of two large Lutheran churches, faced inadequate financial resources and little opportunity for growth. Atonement’s pastor, Rev. Bill Morrissey, had grown up Catholic and attended Catholic seminary before becoming a Lutheran. He reached out to the auxiliary bishop of the Catholic Archdiocese of Portland, Kenneth Steiner, about the possibility of sharing facilities with another church. Father James Parker, vicar for worship and ministries in the archdiocese, was intrigued by the possibility of “sharing more than facilities.” Conversations with the archdiocese and St. Anthony’s Catholic Church resulted in the idea of creating a mission of St. Anthony’s.

Bishop Steiner, representing the Catholics, and Bishop Cliff Lunde, representing the North Pacific District of the American Lutheran Church (ALC), began consulting with both Atonement Lutheran Church and St. Anthony Catholic Church. 

April 1986: Fr. Jim Parker became our "priest moderator" and Bishop Steiner invited members of St. Anthony to be a part of this ecumenical venture. About 20 Catholic families and 22 Lutheran families met weekly to share their personal beliefs and traditions and to talk about how this venture would work. These founding members of our new community soon went on retreat together at the Benedictine Retreat House in Mt. Angel where they decided they did not simply want to share a building but wanted to become a joint community. Our Lutheran pastor and Catholic priest moderator agreed. The vision of a shared community especially appealed to many who were in Lutheran-Catholic marriages. What had been Atonement Lutheran Church now became Mission of the Atonement, a community of Roman Catholics and Lutherans.

July 6, 1986: We celebrated our first “simultaneous yet separate” worship service with Auxiliary Bishop Ken Steiner from the Archdiocese of Portland presiding for the opening.

1987: Franciscan priest Father Matt Tumulty joined us as new priest-moderator and Rev. Dale Jamtgaard joined us as Lutheran pastor after several tumultuous months in which the Lutheran bishop died, the ELCA was formed through a merger of three Lutheran denominations, and both the Lutheran pastor and Catholic priest moderator of Mission of the Atonement resigned. In response, our community had become even more creative and resourceful before our new Lutheran pastor and Catholic priest arrived, as we learned to lead Services of the Word ourselves when we could not find an available supply priest or pastor.

1989: We hosted our first-of-many ecumenical outreach events with church dignitaries—the Lutheran bishop, Paul Swanson, and Roman Catholic archbishop, William Levada.

Early 1990s: Several Lutheran-Catholic couples formed an Ecumenical Couples group and met monthly to discuss issues related to interfaith relationships and parenting. We also discussed the global Lutheran-Catholic dialogues during our adult education hour.

1991: We hosted a conference on inter-church marriages and celebrated our first First Communion of both Catholic and Lutheran children, where they prepared together and then separated for the eucharistic service.

July 1992: Mission of the Atonement was featured in ELCA Voices in an article entitled, “Two Beaverton Catholic Communities: Mission of At-One-Ment.”

1993: Pastor Dale Jamtgaard wrote a chapter, “Mission of the Atonement: Lutheran/Roman Catholic,” in a book, Twelve Tales Untold: A Study Guide for Ecumenical Reception.

1995: Pastor Dale Jamtgaard retired.

1996: We celebrated 10 years as a community, with Roman Catholic Auxiliary Bishop Kenneth Steiner and Lutheran Bishop Paul Swanson in attendance.

We called Laurie Larson Caesar as our part-time Lutheran pastor. (She also served as chaplain for Portland State University.)

Late 1990s: Fr. Matt Tumulty cohosted a series on nonviolence with Franciscan sisters from St. Clare Catholic Church.

November 1996: Mission of the Atonement was featured in an article in The Lutheran entitled “A Time for Unity?”

January/February 1998: Fr. Matt Tumulty published an article in The Way of St. Francis entitled, “A Communion of Churches.”

2000: We hosted an event called “Lutherans and Catholics Together Addressing Family Violence,” with the support of Archbishop Vlazny.

Fr. Matt reflected on Mission of the Atonement’s fifteenth anniversary.

2002-2003: After 15 years with us, Fr. Matt Tumulty announced his retirement. Fr. Neil Moore came out of retirement to become our new priest-moderator. We entered into a covenant with Bilal Mosque.

2004-2005: Mary Follen was hired to be our Catholic lay leader and minister of spiritual programs. We began every-other-year trips to Holden Village as a community.

2006: After several months of discernment and education, we became one of the first Lutheran churches in Oregon to become Reconciling in Christ (a designation adopted by Lutheran congregations that choose to be LGBTQIA-affirming in all areas of ministry).

2007-2008: We established a Long-Range Planning team and began a visioning process, with small discussion groups meeting in homes.

2009: Our community approved a Long-Range Plan. We built the labyrinth and began working to improve the landscaping and create a memorial garden. Father Neil Moore retired again, but he continued to celebrate mass with us occasionally. We began to assemble a team of priests who would alternate preaching and celebrating mass each week, including Fr. Pat Evard and Fr. Leo Remington.

2010: We dedicated the labyrinth with a party, welcoming ELCA Bishop Dave Brauer-Rieke and founding Catholic Bishop Kenneth Steiner. Growth of the community necessitated adding a second worship service.

2011: We celebrated 25 years as a faith community with several great parties and gatherings, including one in which previous pastors and priests came to celebrate. After Mary Follen, Kathy Truman answered the call to be our half-time Catholic lay leader. Our Centering Prayer group formed, modeled after the contemplative prayer practices of Fr. Thomas Keating, a Trappist monk from St. Joseph’s Abbey.

2012: Pastor Laurie took off several months for medical leave. Several ELCA pastors covered her time away. A lay-led pastoral care team was established to respond to pastoral care needs while Pastor Laurie was away. The team was so successful in engaging lay members in caring for one another in times of need that the team continues to this day.

2013: For the first time, we celebrated the liturgical season of Creationtide, created by Pr. Brian Brandt; received a generous grant from ELCA Churchwide; and welcomed our first-ever Lutheran intern, Pr. Nathan Allen, and his family.

2014: We said goodbye to the Allen family and welcomed Catholic lay leader intern, Puanani Lalakea. Pastor Laurie and Kathy Truman joined a group from the ELCA Oregon Synod in visiting the Holy Land. We joined as a team in the AIDS Walk, in addition to beginning annual appearances in the Portland Pride Parade. We held our first annual Advent auction and party, which became a wonderful opportunity to build both community and capacity.

2015: Our youth visited the Trappist Monastery in Lafayette and the Benedictine sisters at Mt. Angel to learn about their lives. They engaged in various service projects and traveled to Detroit for the ELCA churchwide youth assembly. We celebrated “Christians Coming Out Day.”

2016: We changed our name to Spirit of Grace, adopted with unanimous consent after a long process of discernment, research, and voting. Pastor Laurie participated in a “pulpit swap” with other Beaverton pastors called “Got Questions?” Many of our women began a series of meetings with Muslim women. In Advent we celebrated a “Las Posadas” party and auction.

2017: Over 20 members participated in the Women’s March. Our Muslim friend Nura Elmagbari spoke from our pulpit on Mother’s Day. Pastor Laurie set off on a sabbatical for the summer, while the congregation celebrated her sabbatical on their own.

2018: Pastor Laurie and a few others traveled to Washington DC to take part in “March For Our Lives,” while over 30 of us marched in the Portland version. Pastor Laurie also took a trip of pilgrims to Germany to visit famous places of Luther, and Kathy Truman did a civil rights tour during her sabbatical in the fall. Pastor Laurie officiated at her first same-sex wedding. We held a healing service for women who had been affected by sexual harassment, abuse, or assault.

2019: We hosted our first ordination (of our former youth leader, now Pr. Crystal Larsen) and produced a series of three videos to showcase our unique community. Pastor Laurie was elected as bishop of the ELCA Oregon Synod, and we sent her off with all our love, tears, and support, and the biggest Saturday night party and Sunday blessing ever. Logan McLean joined us as our first summer seminarian. Pr. Brian Brandt began as interim pastor. Dr. Michele Sakurai began serving as our interim Director for Catholic Ministries.

2020: In February, we held a “leap day” event called Leap of Faith, to reflect on our Catholic identity and better understand the Catholic side of our twin foundational faith traditions and the Catholic experience at Spirit of Grace. Though postponed due to the pandemic, we repeated this for the Protestant side of our community in April 2022.

With the onset of the pandemic, we had to be creative! We started offering do-it-yourself worship liturgies and gathering as “Tiny Churches” on Zoom. When we realized the pandemic would continue for many months, we began worshiping, educating, and connecting as an entire community over Zoom. Our Director of Catholic Ministries sent out weekly emails to ground people with spiritual practices, including Marian devotion of the Rosary and Advent reflections focused on the value of the Joyful Mysteries.

For the first time since the earliest years of our community, we were searching for both Lutheran and Catholic leadership at the same time, and we had to conduct both call processes and congregational meetings entirely over Zoom.

In December, Pastor Robyn Hartwig accepted the call to be our Lutheran pastor.

2021: In January, Vinci Halbrook-Paterson accepted the call to serve as our director of Catholic ministries.

On March 15, Pastor Robyn and Director Vinci began their new roles while most worship and community life was still taking place on Zoom.

On July 11, we resumed in-person worship as a “hybrid” community, committing to making both worship and adult forums available both in person and over Zoom every Sunday even beyond the pandemic. The tech team mounted a large screen on the back wall of our sanctuary which we began referring to as our “Zoom balcony” or our “virtual balcony.” This term reflected our commitment that those worshiping on Zoom would not merely be spectators but full participants in the worship service and even be able to offer worship leadership roles from the virtual balcony.

In September, Bishop Laurie Larson Caesar installed Pastor Robyn and our priests installed Director Vinci in an installation service with many interfaith guests, followed by a dance party on the labyrinth.

2022: We continued to function as a fully “hybrid” community, with our service and many educational offerings offered both in person and on Zoom.

In Lent 2022, Director Vinci led a retreat on the stations of the cross. On Good Friday, we remembered Jesus’ death on the cross through a visual walk with the Native American stations of the cross created by award-winning Choctaw artist Melanie Twelves.

In September we began hosting monthly Queer Grace gatherings, where someone from the LGBTQIA+ community served as storyteller and shared how their sexual orientation or gender identity has affected their relationship with faith, the Bible, church, God, and themselves.

We held Catholic Synodality listening sessions and submitted a report through the Archdiocese of Portland’s website. We also referred people to local parishes for this process. We held a forum on the Maryknoll Missionaries led by long-time Maryknoll members.

We held a class called “Faith and Democracy in Crisis: Resisting Authoritarianism, Protecting Human Dignity.” Director Vinci led a class on how to counter white Christian nationalism.

2023: In February, we resumed the practice of two Sunday services, the first in person and the second hybrid with a Zoom option.

In October, we hired a new part-time children and family ministries coordinator, Katie Furgison.

During Advent, we provided all members with a copy of Pax Christi’s Advent through Epiphany devotional “Radicalizing Tenderness” written by Sister Norma Pimentel of the Missionaries of Jesus. Pastor Robyn offered a class on engaged contemplation as a means of sharing some of what she learned from Father Richard Rohr and other faculty during the two years she spent in the Living School of the Center for Action and Contemplation.

As Christmas approached, we gave thanks for many new members who joined Spirit of Grace over the previous year. Our community’s membership now stands at 197 people, up 11.6% from the previous Christmas (fueled largely by a 57% growth rate in our children’s ministry).

We continued to nurture strong relationships with several beloved priests who have celebrated mass with us, including Fr. Neil Moore, Fr. Jack Mosbrucker, Fr. Leo Remington, Msgr. Chuck Lienert, and Fr. John McGrann, among others.

On December 7 and 8, our Catholic priests each received a letter from Archbishop Sample stating that they were no longer allowed to celebrate mass at Spirit of Grace after December 10, 2023. Leaders from Spirit of Grace requested a meeting with Archbishop Sample so we can understand why this action was taken. We hope to work together to facilitate the return of priests to celebrate mass at Spirit of Grace, as has been the case for over 37 years.

January 2024: The National Catholic Reporter published an article about Spirit of Grace and the archdiocese’s decision, “Portland archbishop bans Mass for rare Lutheran-Catholic ecumenical community.” We have still not received communication from the Archdiocese of Portland.

September 2024: Our Catholic congregants continue to live out the Catholic faith, striving to build on the vision of Vatican II and live into our unfolding future. Our ecumenical community continues to worship, study, work for justice, and serve those in need as it has for almost four decades. We are a dynamic, questioning, relational community seeking to embody the Lutheran ideal of ecumenical unity in Christ and Catholic Social Teaching, while offering a radical welcome to all people seeking a spiritual home.